A Memorandum of Understanding was signed by six universities on February 20, 2020 at the University of the Philippines-Los Banos to pave the way for the establishment of the Consortium of Open and Distance Education Institutions in the Philippines. Benguet State University was among the six universities; the others are Central Luzon State University, Don Mariano Marcos Memorial State University, Ifugao State University and Mariano Marcos State University.

The MOU provided for the Technical Working (TWG) Group to identify areas of cooperation among the consortium members which will include academic collaboration, capacity building, international collaboration and international accreditation. The MOU was signed in the occasion of UPLB-OU’s 25th Anniversary.

“The consortium will partner with international associations of the same nature and then work out for cultural exchange, student exchange, scholarships, sharing of best practices, training of open distance faculty and training on module development,” said BSU-OU Assistant Director, Dr. Leonardo T. Apilis.

A series of discussions were done before the MOU was signed. The first was a round-table discussion on November 27, 2019 among heads and representatives of universities offering distance education programs where the TWG was formed. This was followed by the first meeting of the TWG on January 30, 2020 at Benguet State University.//JSTabangcura